+
+### getOwnerID( $file )
+#
+# return the uid containing the owner ID of the given file.
+#
+
+sub getOwnerID
+{
+ my($file) = @_;
+ my($uid);
+
+ #
+ # call stat() to get the mode of the file
+ #
+
+ $uid = (stat($file))[4];
+
+ return $uid;
+}
+
+### getMode( $file )
+#
+# return a string containing the mode of the given file.
+#
+
+sub getMode
+{
+ my($file) = @_;
+ my($tempmode, $mode);
+
+ #
+ # call stat() to get the mode of the file
+ #
+
+ $tempmode = (stat($file))[2];
+ if (length($tempmode) < 1)
+ {
+ return "";
+ }
+
+ #
+ # call sprintf to format the mode into a UNIX-like string
+ #
+
+ $mode = sprintf("%04o", $tempmode & 07777);
+
+ return $mode;
+}
+
+### userExists( $username )
+#
+# given a username, return true if the user exists on the system. return false
+# otherwise.
+#
+
+sub userExists
+{
+ my($username) = @_;
+ my($uid);
+
+ #
+ # retrieve the userid of the user with the given username
+ #
+
+ $uid = getpwnam($username);
+
+ #
+ # return true if $uid is defined and has a length greater than 0
+ #
+
+ if ( defined($uid) and (length($uid) > 0) )
+ {
+ return 1;
+ }
+ else
+ {
+ return 0;
+ }
+}